Wisconsin native, conservative critic of everything.
"Once abolish the God, and the government becomes the God." ---G K Chesterton
"The only objective of Liberty is Life" --G K Chesterton
"Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions" --G K Chesterton
"A man can never have too much red wine, too many books, or too much ammunition." -- Rudyard Kipling

Sunday, August 26, 2012

Reduce Wisconsin Spending? Here's One Target.

Governor Walker and the Legislature should be looking--hard--at reducing State spending.

One good place to look? The UW system. Recall that this system was assembled with "bi-partisan" support in Madistan. There's a reason for that, as you'll see below. But first: what to cut? Of the thirteen UW four-year colleges, one stands out.

This bite-size "University" has 2800 students, making it slightly larger than St Norbert's (around 2200) or Mount Mary (1700). But the State spends a lot of money there: $77 million in capital projects in the last 10 years. That's above and beyond the faculty and staff expenses.

Another 6700 students are at UW-River Falls; another 9300 are at Stout in Menomonie--and UW-Eau Claire is also nearby. The NW corner of Wisconsin is over-served with UW locations--or under-served with students--take your choice.

It's not difficult to understand why politicians love UW campuses: they spend a lot of money on construction and faculty. Still don't get it? Follow the money: colleges present a great balance between (R) and (D) fundraising, brought to you by "bi-partisan" cooperation in fleecing the taxpayer.

We're not holding our breath on this one, by the way. The usual ululation about "high-tech" and "educated workforce" from full-throated harpies will commence (at the very same time that Mr. Sullivan's 'workforce commission' will be yammering about finding more welders from Mexico, or someplace.)

The UW System will spend $30,319.00/student this year. Less than half of that will come from student-paid tuition; the rest is largely from State and Federal taxpayers. At that rate, UW Superior will cost taxpayers around $30 million, just this year.